Tag: the 60s

The Hollies are a British band that were far more influential than they often get credit for.

If you’ve heard of the 1960’s British Invasion then you undoubtedly know of The Beatles. When you listen to the harmonies on those early Beatles songs, thank The Hollies. They were pioneers for that style at the time. Are you a fan of Crosby Stills, Nash (and Young)? Thank The Hollies. They were Graham Nash’s first band. How about the music of Elton John and his long musical legacy? Thank The Hollies. He was the session keyboardist for them in the ’60s. Were you into Led Zeppelin in the ’70s? Well thank The Hollies for the early session careers of Jimmy Page and John Paul Jones.

“Hear! Here!” was the Hollies’ second album in the United States. It’s basically, with a couple of track changes, a U.S. version of their third album in Britain, simply titled “Hollies”. Even though the Hollies were very popular in Britain and “Hollies” broke into the top 10 on the U.K. album charts (peaking at number 8), Their U.S. record label was wary of its success here so they didn’t release “Hear! Here!” until two moths after its British counterpart, and only then, only after replacing two of the songs with the Hollies’ currently released U.S. singles. Despite the changes, the album only made it to the 145 position in the U.S. charts, its sales dwarfed by the popularity of albums by The Beatles and The Rolling Stones.

Listening to The Dave Brubeck Quartet’s 1959 album “Time Out”, it’s hard to believe that their style of jazz was once considered to be inaccessibly out of the mainstream because of Brubeck’s consistent use of unusual time signatures. The quartet had a hard time getting booked to play even small clubs that seated less than fifty people because a lot of owners felt Brubeck’s style was just too complex for people to get. Music critics felt the same and totally dissed “Time Out” when it was released.

As it turned out, it was the critics and club owners that didn’t get it.

“Time Out” sold over 50 thousand copies shortly after its initial release and eventually sold over a million, making it one of the best-selling jazz albums of all time. It also nearly topped Billboard’s pop album charts stopping just short at #2.

After the success of “Time Out” the Dave Brubeck Quartet no longer had to worry about filling clubs that seated fifty people. The quartet started playing venues that seated a thousand or more.

In short, “Time Out” firmly founded Dave Brubeck’s reputation as a jazz pioneer and innovator who forever changed how jazz music is played and interpreted.

The Kingsmen are best known for their first and biggest hit “Louie, Louie”, an iconic rock song that is one of the worst recordings ever. So bad in fact that it sparked an FBI investigation.

Seriously, it did.

The song “Louie, Louie” was released as a b-side in 1957 by session musician Richard Berry. His original version was a mid-tempo Island sailor’s lament about longing to see his girlfriend. Not a dirty song at all. In the early ’60s, the song was revived in a more raucous garage rock style by a few groups trying to make a hit out of it. It looked like Paul Revere and the Raiders were going to have the best luck with it. That is, until a Boston DJ featured “Louie, Louie” by the Kingsmen in his “Worst Record of the Week” segment … and the kids loved it!

The Kingsmen recorded “Louie, Louie” in one take with one microphone hung high in the middle of the room. It made all the instruments sound muddied together and left Jack Ely’s vocals muffled and indecipherable. You literally can’t understand half the words he is singing. That’s what prompted the FBI investigation.

Rumors began to circulate that the lyrics to The Kingsmen’s version of “Louie, Louie” were recorded muddied and muffled to hide their profane, dirty lyrics. Parents complained to the authorities about the radio stations constantly playing this dirty song. The complaints eventually made it all the way up to J. Edgar Hoover at the FBI who launched a 30 month investigation into the song’s lyrics. In the end, they determined that Jack Ely was probably singing the correct lyrics to “Louie, Louie” and that the reason the words were unintelligible was because it was one of the worst recordings ever.

The really funny thing about this is that after spending 30 months trying to figure out if The Kingsmen’s “Louie, Louie” was obscene, the FBI never noticed there is actually an F-bomb on the recording. Just before going into the second verse, drummer Lynn Easton apparently dropped one of his drumsticks and blurted out the expletive and the one microphone hung high in the middle of the room captured it. It’s one of those things that isn’t immediately noticeable, but once you hear it the first time, you can’t not hear it every time. You would think that after a 30 month investigation someone at the FBI would’ve heard it.

The Stooges were a band ahead of their time. They were punk rock before there was punk rock. Their music had so much grit and attitude that most rock critics at the time just didn’t get it. But in 1969, Detroit got it. In 1969, Detroit was all about grit and attitude. And survival.

Detroit was trying to come back from the riots two years earlier that had devastated it and left it deeply scarred. The comeback wasn’t going as well as many hoped it would. The scars in the city ran deep. Rather than fluff it up or play it down, the Stooges wore those scars like a badge of honor. Just like Detroit had been forced to strip itself into a primal survival mode after the riots, the Stooges stripped rock and roll down to its basic primal core. Their debut album was music struggling to survive, barely accessible; played with a grit and attitude that was hard for almost anyone outside of Detroit to really get at the time.

Eventually, other cities around the world would start to bear similar wounds to those that scarred Detroit back in 1967. Many new bands started to focus on the same guttural survival instinct in their music that The Stooges had nearly a decade earlier. By that time, the critics had started to get it. They embraced the new sound and dubbed it “punk rock”. Nearly every punk rock band that has ever existed has cited The Stooges as a big influence.

The Detroit Edition of “The Stooges” has two versions of the album. The first is the original record, as it was released in 1969. The second has alternate versions of all the songs. Only eight thousand copies of The Detroit Edition of “The Stooges” were produced as part of a 2018 Record Store Day promotion.

Record Store Day is an annual event that started in the US in 2007 to promote local independent record stores. Typically held in April, it provides local record stores with exclusive limited edition releases. It has become so successful that it’s now held in several countries around the world.

What would the Yardbirds have been without either Clapton, Beck, or Page on lead guitar? Well, in 1984, they were known as “Box of Frogs”.

In the 1960’s, the Yardbirds were at their core, Jim McCarty on drums, Chris Dreja on rhythm guitar, and Paul Samwell-Smith on bass – and they had a knack for picking awesome lead guitarists. Unforfortunately those lead guitarists had a knack for pursuing solo careers. First Eric Clapton, then Jeff Beck. By the time Jimmy Page joined for their third go-round, the founding members decided to call it quits. In the wake, Jimi Page went on to form Led Zeppelin, which he nearly called “The New Yardbirds” (but that’s another story).

Perhaps realizing that great music is not created by lead guitarists alone, McCarty, Dreja, and Samwell-Smith regrouped in the ’80s along with guitarist and vocallist John Fiddler, rebranding themselves on their self titled album as “Box of Frogs”.

Perhaps realizing that this was magic in the re-making, they were joined on some songs by Beck and Page. Sure, Clapton didn’t participate in the reunion, but Rory Gallagher jumped in on a couple; even better, in my humble opinion.

Rick Derringer is one of the most respected blues rock guitarists from the 1970s. In addition to his solo work, including the hit “Rock and Roll Hoochie Koo”, he also lent his six string talents to the bands of brothers Edgar and Johnny Winter and on tour and in the studio with numerous acts. But his first gig was along with his brother Randy (on drums) in The McCoys.

When Derringer became successful in the ’70s, most people probably never made the connection back to The McCoys. Most of their songs, like the title track from their debut album “Hang On Sloopy” were 1960s pop. But their deeper tracks show quick glimpses of what Rick Derringer would unleash years later. I especially love the cover of T-Bone Walker’s blues classic “Call it Stormy Monday” which closes this album out.

But it’s not only the pop style that would have most people miss the connection between blues rock guitarist Rick Derringer and The McCoys. The biggest reason is that when he and brother Randy played in The McCoys, they used their real surname, Zehringer. Going into the ’70s, Rick changed his performing name to something with more of a rock and roll feel to it.

Tomato, tomahto.
Derringer, Zehringer.
Still great, no matter how you say it.

1953 to 1972. If it’s 20 years into the history of rock and roll and you want to chronicle the music year by year on a double album, you better have a recognized rock and roll authority on the cover. Maybe someone like Dick Clark.

From the fifties into the eighties, Dick Clark, a former rock and roll DJ from WFIL in Philadelphia was the host of American Bandstand. In its 37 years on the air, Bandstand helped launch or excel the careers of more rock and roll bands than probably any other single show – over 8 thousand different acts.

I picked this album up at an estate sale not too long ago. Besides being excited about finding this great compilation of early rock and roll, I was really excited find it still had the 24 page yearbook and bonus record still with it. A lot of times, the extras like these get separated from the album. The yearbook was very insightful, talking about significant events of each year and how popular music both affected and was affected by them.

The bonus record is a picture disk that has Dick Clark’s brief recollections of the numerous bands that made their first appearance on one of his shows. It’s a great insight to just how influential Dick Clark and American Bandstand were during the first 20 Years of Rock n’ Roll.

Interpreters are a rare breed of singers. Interpreters don’t need to write their own songs, although they do on occasion; they make any song they sing their own. Interpreters can choose a song that you think could never be done by anyone except the band that first wrote, performed, and made it popular, and turn it into something totally original. They make it unforgettably their own.

Of all the Detroit bands that were ever poised to hit the national spotlight but remained hidden in the shadows from fame, The Frost were grandest.

Back in the ’60s through the ’90s, before the age of streaming, making it in the music industry meant signing a deal with a record label. More importantly, it meant signing a record deal with the right record label. Unfortunately, for The Frost, Vanguard was not the right label. Vanguard abandoned them with virtually no promotion for their albums. While their Detroit contemporaries at the time like Bob Seger, The MC5, Iggy Pop and the Stooges, gained national fame, The Frost achieved a legendary status in Detroit and throughout Michigan, but remained relatively unknown anywhere else.

Except for Dick Wagner.

Dick Wagner was the lead guitarist, vocalist, and one of the chief songwriters for The Frost. He went on to work with Kiss, Alice Cooper, Lou Reed and many others in rock and roll in the 1970s and ’80s. Dick Wagner’s influence has become legendary far beyond Detroit.

“Rock and Roll Music” encapsulates what The Frost’s music was all about. Hard rock, psychedelia, and blues. Half of the album was recorded in Vanguard’s studios in New York, and half was recorded live at the legendary Grande Ballroom in Detroit. The studio material is good, but it’s the live performances here that really make this album stand out. The Frost were first and foremost, a live band.

Even though The Frost never saw the national fame of their contemporaries, that didn’t stop them from becoming highly influential to many national acts that came after them. Today, “Rock and Roll Music” is highly sought by record collectors across the U.S. and even overseas.

Ted Nugent is probably known as much for his right-wing political activism and outspoken nature, especially when it comes to his support of the 2nd amendment to the U.S constitution (the right to keep and bear arms) as he is for his guitar playing. Whether or not you agree with Ted Nugent’s political views or like his in your face, sometimes brash nature, you can’t deny he is one of the best rock guitarists ever. It’s that incredible guitar playing that really makes “Journeys and Migrations” the great compilation that it is.

The album gets it title from The Amboy Dukes’ early albums “Journey to the Center of the Mind” and “Migration”. The Amboy Dukes only had one big hit in their existence from 1968 to 1965. “Journey to the Center of the Mind” from the album of the same name, pretty much represents the psychedelic sound of most of the songs featured here, although the band does occasionally wander into jazz, doo-wop, and hard rock territory.

In order to release their records in Great Britain, The Amboy Dukes had to change their name, since there was already a band performing there under the same name. Appropriately, they chose to call themselves The American Amboy Dukes.